To watch or not to watch, Super Bowl XLV?

Even the commercials are worth watching on ‘Super Sunday.’ On the other hand, the Patriots aren’t playing and no one may play next season, so why bother tuning in on Sunday?

By Glen Farley

The Patriot Ledger, Quincy, MA

By Glen Farley

Posted Feb. 4, 2011 at 12:01 AM
Updated Feb 4, 2011 at 4:07 AM

By Glen Farley

Posted Feb. 4, 2011 at 12:01 AM
Updated Feb 4, 2011 at 4:07 AM

» Social News

Will you or won’t you? Should you or shouldn’t you?

Here are five reasons to tune in to Fox to watch Sunday night’s Super Bowl XLV matchup between the Green Bay Packers and the Pittsburgh Steelers from Cowboys Stadium and five reasons to turn away from the game:

REASONS TO WATCH

1. It’s the most wonderful time of the year: Simply put, the Super Bowl is the biggest game of them all in the greatest sport of them all.

(Total disclosure: Those words were typed by a guy who watched the three-hour Pro Bowl pregame show and the game itself last Sunday night; yup, I’m the one.)

There’s no four-out-of-seven format in play here.

Unless the World Series or league final goes to a seventh game, baseball, basketball and hockey can’t match the drama that football, with its “win or go home” format, brings.

And with the uncertainty surrounding the labor landscape, who’s to say when we’ll have the opportunity to watch the NFL again?

Better tune in early (anyone up for the NFL Network’s 81/2 hours of pregame coverage?) and stay late. This might be it for a while.

2. One-hundred-and-six million Americans can’t be wrong: At 106.476 million, New Orleans’ 31-17 victory over Indianapolis in Super Bowl XLIV ranks as the most-watched American television program of all time.

Do you really want to be the geek who shuffles over to the office cooler on Monday morning and, amidst the animated conversation, says, “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I was watching ‘Undercover Boss’?”

3. You’re a history buff: OK, so I’m a sentimental fool.

When I think of the Packers, I think beyond Brett Favre and No. XXXI against the Patriots and all the way back to a time when the team was quarterbacked by Bart Starr for the coach for whom the championship trophy is named.

When I think of the Steelers, I think past Santonio Holmes and his spectacular, game-winning catch against Arizona in Super Bowl XLIII and all the way back to a time when the team was winning in the postseason on a reception that was immaculate (Franco Harris in Pittsburgh’s 1972 AFC divisional playoff with Oakland).

Ask me my wife’s name and it’s 50-50 I’ll know the answer, but I can still recall my dad taking me to a Celtics-Philadelphia 76ers game on Jan. 15, 1967, and being in a hurry to get home to watch the Pack defeat the Kansas City Chiefs, 35-10, in Super Bowl I.

With Pittsburgh claiming the Vince Lombardi Trophy six times and Green Bay three, this Super Bowl is rich in pigskin past.

Page 2 of 3 - 4. The commercials: Hey, sponsors aren’t paying $3 million for a 30-second spot to have you watch “America’s Funniest Home Videos.”

Besides, even if the game isn’t entertaining, the ads often are.

This game gave us McDonald’s “Nothing But Net” with Larry Bird and Michael Jordan and the Budweiser “Frogs.”

Hey, the guy played his position a whole lot better than Adalius Thomas did.

5. It’s a reason to party: Super Bowl parties are like New Year’s Eve parties.

They’re everywhere.

Even I’ve been invited to one.

REASONS NOT TO WATCH

1. The Patriots aren’t in it: Grand plans were being made around New England a few weeks ago, weren’t they?

In the aftermath of a league-best 14-2 finish, all that remained to be determined was the Patriots’ foe the night of Feb. 6 at Cowboys Stadium. The fact that the Patriots would be there, the fourth Super Bowl title of the Bill Belichick-Tom Brady era in sight.

Then the New York Jets intervened.

We are nothing but provincial in New England.

No Pats? Who cares?

2. Ben Roethlisberger is in it: And if the Steelers quarterback, who sat out the first four games of the season for violating the NFL’s personal conduct policy, wins it, he’ll have three Super Bowl rings, the same number as New England’s “Lord of the Rings.”

Think that will spark debate?

It already has.

Give “Big Ben” his due.

With his linebacker-like size, he’s able to extend plays. He’s repeatedly shown the ability to make big plays in big games, even in those in which he’s been lousy (see: AFC Championship Game).

But for a Brady bunch of reasons – the best year in NFL history (2007), a 2010 campaign in which he may have been even better (a touchdown pass-to-interception ratio of 36-to-4, a league-record 335 straight throws without a pick to close the regular season – I believe No. 12 in a Patriots uniform is better.

“I don’t think I’m on any of their levels,” Roethlisberger told ESPN’s Merril Hoge when the latter mentioned to him that a win would put him in a class with Joe Montana, Terry Bradshaw, Troy Aikman and Brady as quarterbacks with three rings or more.

Good answer.

3. The game usually isn’t compelling: Sure, the last three have been, but on the 25th anniversary of the Patriots’ 46-10 shellacking at the hands of the Chicago Bears, have we forgotten that the Super Bowl often fails to live up to the hype?

Page 3 of 3 - Twenty-eight of the 44 Super Bowls to date have been decided by double-figure margins of victory, the average margin of victory has been 14.5 points and 11 of the games – that would be 25 percent – have been settled by 21 points or more.

We’ve had a 45-point decision (San Francisco over Denver in No. XXIV), but we’ve yet to have a Super Bowl go to overtime.

On Wednesday, The Associated Press was told that “R&B star Usher and former Guns ’N Roses guitarist Slash will make surprise appearances.

I must be getting old.

I thought “usher” was the person who directed you to your seat; when I think of “Slash,” I think of Kordell Stewart.

5. Send a message: If the NFL and NFLPA want to toy with your emotions, you’ll show them.

Nice to see that on Saturday in Dallas, Super Bowl eve, the two sides will set aside some time for a formal bargaining session, but we’re now a month away from a potential lockout that could ultimately jeopardize the future of an industry that raked in more than $8 billion last season.

So why not boycott the game when it’s being played on its biggest stage? Get used to a Sunday with no football.

Read a book, play with the kids, spend some quality time with your spouse. You’ll survive.

OK, forget the part about spending some time with your spouse. One of the other two activities won’t kill you.